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Starbucks on Thursday announced it will close about 1% of its North American cafes as part of its turnaround. Under CEO Brian Niccol, Starbucks has staged a revamp of its U.S. business that has focused on improving the customer experience, including in-person interactions at its cafes. The announcement marks the second round of closures in North America during Niccol's two-year tenure. Starbucks expects to shutter about 250 underperforming cafes out of its more than 18,000 locations in North America. It was not immediately clear where the closing locations are. "We have carefully reviewed our North America coffeehouse portfolio and identified locations where we do not believe we can consistently deliver the experience we want for customers and partners or where we don't see a path to acceptable financial performance," Mike Grams, Starbucks chief operating officer, wrote in a letter addressed to employees. For fiscal 2026, Starbucks is now projecting net new openings of 440 cafes, down from its prior outlook of 600 to 650 locations. Those new cafes will come from its international markets. "The Company continues to see significant longer-term growth opportunity ahead in North America and is actively developing a strong pipeline of new coffeehouses," Starbucks said in a regulatory filing. Most of the closures will occur before the end of fiscal 2026, according to the filing. Starbucks' fiscal year ends later this month. The company expects to incur about $300 million in restructuring charges related to the closures. About $200 million of that charge will be related to the costs of exiting leases early and paying employees separation benefits. The remaining $100 million will be noncash charges from the disposal and impairment of its company-owned restaurant assets.
document fetched 2026-09-25 02:58 · canonical https://cnbc.com/2026/09/24/starbucks-to-close-250-stores.html